Ebay drops after giving a lukewarm profit forecast

(RTTNews) - eBay Inc. (EBAY) Thursday reported a profit for the second quarter that came in line with Wall Street estimates, while revenues trumped expectations.

eBay's second-quarter profit was $27 million or $0.02 per share, down from $435 million or $0.38 per share last year.

Second-quarter results were negatively impacted by a income tax charge of $311 million related to the ongoing realignment of eBay's legal structure.

Excluding one-time items, income from continuing operations were $493 million or $0.45 per share. A survey polled by Thomson Reuters showed that analysts expected earnings of $0.45 per share.

Revenues for the quarter rose 4 percent to $2.33 billion from last year's revenues of $2.23 billion. Analysts had a consensus revenue estimate of $2.31 billion for the quarter.

"In Q2, eBay delivered strong top and bottom line financial results, led by Marketplace acceleration," said CEO Devin Wenig. "During the past two years, we have made significant progress to modernize eBay and drive growth by improving the customer experience, creating a product catalog that covers more than half of our inventory, and sharpening the eBay brand."

The company said added over 2 million active buyers to a total of 171 million active buyers on the site. Gross merchandise volume for the quarter increased 3 percent to $21.5 billion.

Looking forward to the third quarter, the company expects revenues between $2.35 billion and $2.39 billion and adjusted earnings of $0.46 to $0.48 per share. Analysts currently expect earnings of $0.48 per share on revenues of $2.32 billion.

For full year 2017, the company continues to expect revenues between $9.3 billion to $9.5 billion and adjusted earnings of $1.98 to $2.03 per share. Analysts currently estimate earnings of $2.01 per share and revenues of $9.41 billion.

EBAY closed Thursday's trading at $37.18, up $0.10 or 0.27%, on the Nasdaq. The stock, however, dropped $1.18 or 3.17% in the after-hours trading.